


Fighting Words

by skitzofreak



Series: stardust in your spine [1]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Alcohol, F/M, No longer canon-compliant, Or At Least I Tried, Seriously so much swearing, Some Humor, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, Swearing, Theft, fierce adult Jyn meets fierce adult Leia, more than one way to fight, tiny fierce Jyn meets not so tiny Cassian, tiny fierce Leia meets tiny fierce Jyn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-23
Updated: 2017-08-08
Packaged: 2018-12-05 22:44:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11587698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skitzofreak/pseuds/skitzofreak
Summary: Diplomat-trained Leia is eight years old, and learning the many ways to fight the Empire. Partisan-trained Jyn is eleven years old, and maybe has a few weapons she can spare.





	1. don't give a damn 'bout my bad reputation

**Author's Note:**

> Based on that image from a Star Wars comic (I can't find which one) where Bail Organa and Saw Gerrera are clearly arguing in the Yavin IV command center, each with a tiny, dark haired girl at their side.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They trade insults like tacticians discussing battle strategies on the field, like soldiers gearing up for war.

Leia does not like Saw Gerrera.

“He is a difficult man to like,” her father says, all gentle understanding in the shuttle. “Nevertheless, we must find our common ground, for we stand against a common enemy.”

Leia nods; she is eight years old and already she knows The Enemy, knows that even if Gerrera is grouchy and harsh and smells like burned machine oil and sweat, he is an ally against the enemy that Leia will fight to her last breath. She is eight years old and already she has held a blaster, written a declaration of protest, smuggled secret messages in the pockets of her neat little dress.

“He’s not very nice,” she still says, because she’s also eight years old and has not yet mastered the difficult art of keeping her opinions to herself. Her tutors worry a great deal that she will never learn to guard her tongue. Her parents worry a little that she will never learn to guard her heart. Leia doesn’t worry about either of those things at all.

“No, not nice at all, I should think,” her father smiles, his big, real smile that Leia sees much less these days. “But kind, in his own rough way.”

“Kind?” Leia’s tone is disbelieving; she listened to the briefing for this meeting along with the rest of the entourage, and given all the things she heard about Gerrera’s latest activities, kindness does not seem to be a big motivator for the Lion of Onderon.

“Kindness can take many forms, Leia. If Gerrera had no kindness at all, then he would not lead such a large and powerful group as the Partisans,” her father reminds her, and seems to want to say more, but his aide leans forward and announces that they have broken atmosphere on Yavin IV _,_ and the Partisan leader is already waiting for them in the command conference room.  “Come then, dearest,” her father says. “Come and observe, and –“

“Listen to what is said, hear what is not said,” Leia recites in a sing-song voice.

Another smile, and Bail sweeps an arm around her narrow shoulders for a brief hug before rising to exit the shuttle.

The command conference room is dark, and the terminals and screens inside are all at least three years out of date, or look like they were pieced together from different equipment kits scrounged from junkyards and second-hand tech dealers. The Alliance personnel (if they can really be called that, when they are mostly disaffected soldiers, refugees turned rebels, desperate people with nowhere else to go) shuffle around in the dim light, trying to force all the disparate equipment to work.  A human man and a green Twi’lek woman are whispering furiously to each other over a sparking console, and as Leia watches, the man thumps the console with a heavy fist until the screen clears. A Bothan is trying to wire up a green-hued star map panel to the command console in the center of the room with what looks like cheap plas-tape. Leia catches sight of a lanky, dark haired boy sitting by the far wall of the still-not-enclosed room, leaning over what looks like a broken Imperial security droid, sparks from his repair-tool flickering in the gloom.

This is Senator Bail Organa’s meeting, and Leia knows he is responsible for much of the equipment the Alliance has managed to scrape together, but his tailored cloak and neat beard seem oddly out of place here. The man who stands tall by the central command station looks more at home among the hodgepodge, his own gear worn and pitted by blaster fire, his cloak fraying at the seams. At his back, four other fighters cluster: a diminutive Talpini with a vicious scowl, two hulking Tognaths that appear to be eggmates, and a furious looking woman in dark facepaint. All four look ready to kill at the drop of hat, though none of them are visibly armed.

Something small and dark hovers at Gerrera’s elbow, and with a little start, Leia realizes that it is a girl roughly her own age. The girl is small, pale, dark haired, like Leia. Leia, however, is in the pristine white gown of an Aldaraanian princess, while this girl wears what looks like cut-down trousers and a grimy, too large shirt. Leia’s hair is combed into two smooth buns, styled to indicate both her status as eldest child of royalty and tied with ribbons that indicate she has earned her mid-level political history and analysis certifications. The other girl has two messy braids hanging down her back like tails, and if they indicate anything other than her lack of a hairbrush, Leia does not know. The biggest difference, of course, is that Leia stands with her small fingers folded neatly in front of her, while the other girl has one grimy hand on a knife hilt on her belt, and the other curling and uncurling over an empty blaster holster that hangs almost down to her knees.

They look at one another. Leia wonders what the other girl sees.

“If you are going to complain about my command on Toydaria,” Gerrera snaps as they enter the room, before even the barest of polite greetings can be exchanged, before anyone can be introduced, “do not waste my time. We needed those supplies.”

“I am unfamiliar with the specifics of the situation,” Leia’s father replies calmly, carefully. “I am certain that you made the best decision available to you. I only sorrow for the families of the miners who must now be in mourning.”

“ _Imperial_ miners,” Gerrera grunts, and Leia frowns. There is no kindness in the words. Across from her, the other girl frowns back, and then turns to glare at Leia’s father.

A pause where the Senator seems poised to continue the discussion, then he stops and places his hands on the edge of the command station instead. “I would prefer we speak of the opportunity on Mustafar.”

Senator Organa presents several files that his intelligence network has turned up for him, and Leia notices that while he gives the information his people have found, he never mentions the word “Fulcrum.” Leia glances at the entourage that stands around the two men and wonders if it is not only from Gerrera that her father is hiding that particular designator. The talk shifts to strategy, and Gerrera is in favor of much bolder - much _bloodier_ \- action than the Senator thinks is wise. Their arguments begin to go in circles; Gerrera’s voice becomes harsh and grating, Organa’s turns cold and cutting. Other voices from both sides chime in, and Leia struggles to track them all. The Partisans want to spring a trap, slaughter the enemy without mercy, and the Aldaraanians want to capture, to interrogate, to subvert.

Leia listens to Gerrera’s words, and hears anger, hatred, pain, but though she’s looking for it, she hears no kindness.

“A compromise, perhaps,” Leia’s father tries at one point, but before he can complete the sentence, Gerrera thumps a heavy metal gauntlet on the command station.

“ _Compromise_!” he bellows, “When the shadow of the Emporer’s attack dog pollutes the galaxy and all your forces are but scattered flickers in the black? Cowardice to speak of compromise! Spineless to dance around the threat!”

Leia does not like Saw Gerrera much at all.

Neither does her father’s entourage, some of whom start shouting back, and then the Partisans are leaning forward and spitting insults, and the conference room is awash with angry voices and accusing fingers.  Her father turns and drops a hand on Leia’s shoulder again, weary. “Go outside, dearest,” he says, in as low a voice as is possible over the ruckus. “There is little this meeting will teach that I would have you learn, at present.”

“I’m not afraid of him,” Leia frowns at her father, because she loves him but she can tell when he’s trying to shield her from unpleasant things, and Leia does not want to be coddled.

“Of course not,” her father replies with only a shadow of his real smile. “But you will gain nothing here, and perhaps you will find something of greater value outside in the sunlight.”

Leia shakes her head at this, but the shouting does seem pointless and anyway her feet are tired from standing, so she goes. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees a tall, redhaired human male make a sharp gesture towards her, and the lanky boy in the back puts down his tools and steps away from his droid. Leia frowns, because she does _not_ need a minder, but she knows better than to argue. The boy doesn’t come up to her, though, so she turns her back on him and pretends not to see. A few minutes later, when she glances back, the boy has apparently vanished into the crowd of the hanger anyway.

She’s barely been out of the conference room for five minutes, wandering the busy hanger and looking at the carbon-scored X-wings that have clearly seen better days, when Saw Gerrera sends someone to interrogate her.

She knows that’s what he’s done, because the girl from the conference room marches up to Leia, crosses her arms, and says, “Saw Gerrera sent me to interrogate you.”

The other girl is a few centimeters taller, and Leia can see scabs on her knuckles, an old bruise peeking out of the loose collar of her old shirt. She stands like the security guards in her father’s entourage, and her eyes are snapping and fierce. She looks like she could probably knock Leia down and maybe hurt her before Leia’s own guards could come to the rescue. She looks like she wouldn’t recognize kindness if it bit her. If she’s Gerrera’s daughter, Leia thinks a little uncharitably, then she probably wouldn’t.

Leia crosses her arms too and tilts her chin up. “Then he’s stupid.”

The girl glares, but says nothing, and doesn’t move.

“And you’re stupid too, if you try it,” Leia continues, because her tutors were right and she will probably never learn to guard her tongue.

Another silence, and then the other girl raises her eyebrow. “That’s it?”

Leia frowns. “What?”

“ _Stupid_? That’s what you’ve got?” She snorts. “That’s the worst insult I’ve ever heard.”

Now it is Leia’s turn to glare.

“I told him a spoiled princess isn’t going to know anything worth the asking, anyway,” the girl says at last, dismissive.

Leia’s teeth clench. “Go _away_ , you…” she hunts for something other than ‘stupid,’ but Leia is the eight-year-old daughter of a Queen and a politician and she is brilliant in many things but creative profanity is not one of them (yet).

The other girl stares at her with only barely concealed contempt, clearly waiting.

“You silly girl,” finishes Leia grimly, falling back on the only other rude thing she’s really ever heard anyone say.

The other girl makes a choked noise, and it takes Leia a moment to realize that she’s swallowing a laugh. “I take it back. _That_ is the worst insult I’ve ever heard.”

Leia’s scowl deepens. “And you’ve heard many?”

“Yes,” the other girl says simply, like it should be obvious. Then, after a second, she tilts her head. “Jyn,” she announces, with the air of someone deciding something.

“Never heard that one,” Leia replies tartly. “Is it Rodian?”

“It’s not an insult, it’s my name,” the girl snaps. “If I wanted to insult you, I could do better than Rodian.”

Leia does not know many bad words, but she knows a challenge when she hears one. “Prove it.”

The corner of Jyn’s mouth tugs up in a brief smile, and abruptly, she turns on her heel and starts to march away. “Come on then,” she calls. She stops after a few steps, glances back over her boney shoulder, and adds impatiently, “Your skinny shadow can come too, if he keeps his bloody distance.”

Leia glances around, but no one seems to be watching them.  It’s probably a bad idea to follow one of Gerrera’s people out of the Base One hallways and towards a rickety-looking ladder propped against the outer wall. But Leia’s neve backed down from a challenge in her short life, and anyway her feet still hurt from standing around. Besides, the girl seems to think that someone’s watching, even if she’s wrong, that will probably be good enough.

So she follows, and when the girl – Jyn – starts to pull herself up the ladder towards a low section of the base’s roof, Leia climbs after.  On the roof, Jyn flops against a worn bit of rubble and fishes around in a pouch attached to her belt, just behind the blaster holster, which Leia notes with some alarm is no longer empty. Jyn’s blaster is a standard issue model, but against her small waist it seems awkward and oversized. Jyn pushes it to the side to give her better access to her pouch, and then somewhat triumphantly yanks a small silver flask out of the worn leather.

“Nicked it from Euwood,” she says, as if this explained everything.

Leia presses her lips together, glances one more time at the blaster, and sits.

Jyn flicks the cap off the flask with a practiced motion, and takes a swig. “It’s too sweet,” she informs Leia. “But it’s better than that mynock piss Codo likes. And it’s not strong enough to get us really drunk, but it’ll work okay.”

Leia wonders if this is a trap, or if the girl is just trying to be…sociable? “Alcohol clouds the mind,” she stalls, parroting one of her many lessons on self-control and poise. 

Leia expects a scowl, or maybe a punch, but Jyn just nods. “And it dehydrates you,” she agrees in an almost friendly tone. At Leia’s surprised expression, Jyn shrugs. “We just spent eight months in a desert,” she tells Leia, making a broad gesture towards the launch pad where the Partisan’s battered shuttle is just barely visible. “You don’t drink hooch when you barely got water. That’s just…” she grins suddenly. “Stupid.”

“I thought you knew better insults than that.” Leia takes the flask, eyes it for a moment, and then takes a small sip. It _is_ too sweet, and smells a little like socks, but there’s a sort of fruity aftertaste that she doesn’t mind. She passes the flask back and tilts her chin in challenge again. “Don’t you?”

“Alright, fine. Only a snollygarsted ass-goblin with a moldy toast for brains would ever drink kriffing hooch in the desert.”

Leia stares at her, “Snolly-what?”

Jyn rolls her eyes, swigs from the flask, hands it back over. “It’s not all just cuss words, you know. Cussing someone out is like fighting them, kinda. Insults are like weapons. And people expect dirty words. Well,” she pauses, thinking. “They expect them from other adults. Little girls saying cuss words always seems to surprise people. So that’ll work for you, too.”

Leia drinks, stares at the flask. “People never expect anything from little girls.”

“Yeah, I love it,” Jyn remarks, then flicks a dismissive hand at Leia’s face. “Any advantage I can get, yeah?”

Leia hums. “A blaster the enemy sees in your hand is weaker yet than a hairpin they do not know you possess,” she quotes in her sing-song voice.

Jyn looks at her like she’s gone mad. “What is _that_?”

“My tutors say it sometimes. It’s supposed to mean that it’s good to let your enemy underestimate you. Or it’s bad to let them know what you can do.” Leia frowns, the lessons starting to tangle around in her mind. Maybe Jyn lied, and the stuff in that flask is stronger than it tastes.

“Your tutors sound like poncy moof-milkers,” Jyn sneers.

 _Moof-milker_ , Leia thinks. “That one sounds more like a job than an insult.”

“It’s both,” Jyn shrugs. “You spend hours working all bent over to get maybe a cupful of milk, and you get covered in caked shit. Only pus-crusted fools choose that kriffing job.”

 “My etiquette tutor likes to call people yokels,” Leia says after a moment. “She always says it like an insult, but I think it just means ‘common.’”

Jyn wrinkles her nose, swipes the flask back. “Rich people like doing that,” she grumbles. “Because it’s definitely a damn insult, but they can pretend it isn’t, and if you get mad about it they act like you’re the one who’s -” she waves the flask around, apparently at a loss for words.

“Kriffing unreasonable,” Leia supplies, and snags the flask neatly from Jyn’s moving hand.

“Nice,” Jyn says approvingly, then her face settles back into a scowl.  “But if your tutor ever calls me a yokey –“

“Yokel.”

“I’ll probably punch her karking kneecaps backwards.”

“That’s such an unnecessarily violent response,” Leia says primly.

“That’s what the Alliance _always_ says,” Jyn retorts bitterly, but the words sound a little misplaced, like she’s repeating something she’s heard many times without really thinking about it herself. “And then you all sit in your fancy palaces while the rest of us die knee-deep in shit.”

“You wouldn’t have to die _anywhere_ if you didn’t charge in like crazed nerfs – “

“What are we supposed to do, sit on our chapped asses and let the shit-eaters in the Imperial fleet crush us –“

“You could just _stop_ ,” Leia throws her hands up in exasperation, because this is exactly her father has been trying to teach them, what Leia’s been working to learn for her whole life and -

“Fuck that,” Jyn replies with a sudden savageness. “Fuck it _sideways_ , with a sweaty maggot-coated bantha dildo.”

There’s a short, stunned silence, and then Leia leans shifts her weight, hands the flask back. “I like that one,” she says quietly.

Jyn snorts, and the heat of the moment dissipates. “Told you,” she mutters, and takes the peace offering. “Weapons.”

Leia folds her arms across her knees. “And you want to fight.”

“Sure.” Jyn eyes her. “You, too.”

For the first time, Leia feels herself grinning. “Well, of course.”

“So then,” Jyn downs a long drink from the flask, taps it upside down on the warm stone of the ancient temple beneath them. “You oughta be armed.”

And Leia maybe understands what her father was trying to tell her when he said that kindness can come in many forms, as she and a rough-edged girl trade insults like tacticians discussing battle strategies on the field, like soldiers gearing up for war.

 

 

Three hours later, Bail Organa finds Leia sitting quietly in their shuttle, ready to depart. “I hope that you, at least, gained something from this day’s work,” he says tiredly, but with no little fondness.

“Yes, Father,” Leia smiles. “I have.”

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While I love all the parallels between Cassian and Leia, I sort of desperately love the idea that Jyn and Leia would have been friends, both because they are fierce and powerful but also because they are rebels to the core. And I could not resist sliding Cassian into the background, although he's already so good at blending into it that he practically drops right out of the narrative. Maybe I'll write a second part, from Jyn's point of view, and see what happens when she decides to confront the princess's shadow.
> 
> (Side note: it's my new headcanon that one reason Leia is so good at hitting all of Han's buttons later because she remembers Jyn teaching her to aim for the insecurities).


	2. she's alot like you (the dangerous type)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leia leaves. Her shadow doesn't. Jyn reacts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I went to all the bother of including Cassian in the background of my one shot, I felt compelled to bring him further into the foreground, because of course I did.

Jyn doesn’t like to think about the past.

She definitely doesn’t talk about it, anyway. Her life in a guerrilla-fighter resistance group facing the mightiest government in the galaxy is already dangerous enough. The danger isn’t just from the Imperials, either, though she knows _they_ would have no trouble killing an eleven year old, rebel or not. She trusts the other Partisans to shoot at Imperials, to take orders in the field when the battle is on, and to know how to do their jobs in a mission. She does not, and will never, trust them with anything more personal. Her history is as personal as it gets, and there are far too many secrets – too many weapons - there that will cut her deep if anyone discovers them. She can’t talk to Partisans; she can’t even talk about with Saw, who already knows those secrets; the one time she ever mentioned Lah’mu to him, he’d knocked her on her back and roared that the past was nothing but a trap for the unwary.

So Jyn doesn’t like to talk about it, and she doesn’t like to think about it, and anyway it’s all dead and gone and not important anymore. In fact, she gets annoyed (and afraid, and a little sick) whenever someone tries to ask her where she’s from, who are her parents, why is she with Saw…anything that isn’t relevant to the mission, to the present. She’s eleven years old, and Jyn’s already mastered the fine art of deflection; she changes the subject, distracts the questioner, or just turns abruptly and violently hostile. At this point, only the newest recruits in the Partisans – and the civilians she occasionally meets when she’s out pretending to be a normal little girl during an infiltration mission – ever dare to ask her the questions she dreads.

She been on this roof for two hours, drinking stolen hooch and trading insults with Leia (an honest-to-Force Princess of a Core world), and never once has the other girl asked about her past. Jyn figures that’s probably why she likes her.

Well, that, and it’s really kriffing funny to watch her prim little face contort as she tries to repeat Jyn’s filthier curses like she’s not vaguely horrified by them.

“ _Nim gar troac varbeck_ ,” she says a little awkwardly, frowning a bit as she concentrates. “That’s Mandalorian, right?” Several steps behind them both, Jyn hears the faint scrape of cloth on the crumbling stone of the roof. Apparently, the princess’s shadow recognizes the language, too, and probably the insult. Jyn debates telling her tiny drinking buddy to ask _him_ for a translation, then decides against it. As far as she can tell, Leia doesn’t even know he’s back there, and he hasn’t interfered with them yet. She can afford to ignore him a little longer.

“Yeah, southern dialect, I think.” Jyn kicks her scuffed boots (scavenged, a size too big and scuffed with thick socks to keep her ankles from chaffing) against the roof of this big stone temple where the Alliance seems to have set up shop. Alliance, she thinks with some of Saw’s derision. _A noble name_ , her mentor had said on the way to this backwater planet whose name she was never told, _chosen by politicians in committee, before they even had a blaster between them._

“May your…your…something,” Leia folds her arms, not quite admitting defeat.

“May your genitals revolt,” Jyn supplies. “It’s meaner in Mando’a. They’ve got a whole thing about bodies belonging to the person. The idea that some part of them wouldn’t, I dunno, be under their own control or something, that’s pretty bad to them.” She waits to see if Leia will ask how Jyn knows about Mandalorian body culture, and relaxes when the princess merely nods and takes back the flask they’ve been passing back and forth.

They emptied that flask once already, but Jyn just shimmied down for a moment and nicked a bottle of some kind of whiskey from a crate she found in the hangar not two minutes after landing here (really, the security on this “base” is laughable. No wonder Saw always looks more and more pissed off every time they meet with Alliance people). She’s watered down the hooch, of course; this isn’t technically enemy territory but there’s no way she’s risking getting drunk surrounded by people who look at the Partisans like they just crawled out of a sewer.

“Cultural context is more valuable than a thousand protocol droids,” the princess chirps in that sing-song voice that means she’s reciting something a tutor said.

“I thought protocol droids were supposed to know that stuff, too.”

“They do,” Leia sighs, “but sometimes they don’t think to tell you about it until it’s too late. At least, our protocol droid doesn’t,” she adds with a grumpy frown.

Jyn shrugs. She doesn’t have a lot of experience with droids, beyond the cheap, half-broken medical droids the Partisans sometimes manage to salvage (or steal) for their various bases. “Why not? What’s the point of it then?”

Leia makes a small, delicate hand motion that Jyn takes as _how should I know?_ It irritates her mildly that even her offhand gestures look elegant. It just makes Jyn feel even grubbier and…well, anyway, Jyn’s the one with the blaster. The princess probably can’t even assemble a three-stage improvised trap-bomb out of old speeder parts, let alone shoot down Stormtroopers in a raid.

Vaguely, Jyn recalls that Leia’s shadow had been tinkering with a droid, before the Senator had sent the princess out and some tall Alliance flunky with red hair and a scowl like a constipated wookie had gestured at the lanky boy to follow her. Saw had signaled to Jyn a moment later, still facing the stubborn Alliance leadership and bellowing over their fluttery excuses. It had been a hand sign they used when moving through civilian spaces, hidden under the table. _Follow and interrogate._ She’d assumed he meant the boy, at first, because what would an eight year old princess know that the Partisans could use? The boy has callouses on his hands and a blaster holster hidden under his overlarge jacket; he clearly is a much better source of intel.

But Saw clearly jerked his head at the retreating form of the girl, so Jyn had sidled through the crowd of shouting adults, slipping a hand over Euwood’s belt and sliding his blaster and his flask free as she went.

The boy with the droid had seen her from where he hovered several feet behind the princess, and they’d stared at each other for a long minute across the hangar. Then Jyn had deliberately turned away, jammed the blaster and flask into her own belt and marched up to the princess. And now the two of them are on the roof of the Alliance hideout, drinking and cussing, while the shadow lurks somewhere behind a low crumbling wall behind them. For the second time, Jyn considers calling out and asking him to explain droids, because anyone who can mess around so casually with a KX series probably knows at least a thing or two about them. Before she can make up her mind, however, Leia heaves a deep sigh and takes a final gulp of the watered down whiskey.

“I should go back,” she says briskly, like she’s scolding herself. “If I’m gone too long, they’ll send someone to fetch me,” her face sharpens into a waspish frown, “and I do _not_ like being _fetched_.”

Jyn grunts, both annoyed and amused to confirm that Leia does not, in fact, know about her shadow. She’s also a little annoyed to discover that she doesn’t really want Leia to leave. It’s been a long time since she’s been around someone even remotely close to her own age for more than a moment or two. Longer still since she’s had any fun with them. Before she can stop herself, she tries for a moment to remember the last time…

But Jyn doesn’t like to think about the past, so she shoots that thought and burns the body.

“ _Yraate irrgat uhro gherya_ ,” she raises the flask in salute as Leia climbs to her feet.

Leia stares at her in astonishment. “Is that a language, or did you just swallow gravel?”

“Ubese,” Jyn grins at her. “Used by Outer Rim bounty hunters. Means ‘Your bounties will always be large.’”

“Is…that an insult?”

“Depends on who your enemies are.”

Leia thinks about that for a moment, then laughs. “Then it’s a compliment, for us.”

Jyn jumps a little bit at the “us,” although she supposes it’s true. Even if the Alliance is just a gaggle of shit-stained jelly-spines (Magva Yarro’s words, but Jyn thinks it’s a really clever way of calling someone a coward), they are after all, all enemies of the Empire. “Yeah,” she says eventually. “Guess so.”

Leia steps towards the ladder, pauses, looks back. “Farewell, Jyn,” she says regally. “May the Force be with you.” A little smile tugs at her prim mouth, “You warthog-faced buffoon,” she finishes triumphantly, and then is down the ladder and gone before Jyn can fire back.

Jyn lets her smirk die, and then leans back and stretches her legs out on the stone. “Hey,” she says abruptly, looking out over the jungle. “Aren’t you going to follow her?”

For a long moment, she hears nothing but the rustle of wind in trees and the distant hum of machines in the hangar bay. Then, slowly, the faint scrape of boots on stone, and the shadow walks around the crumbling wall to stand a few feet away. Jyn tilts her head back to look up at him (and then tilts it a little farther, because he’s taller than she expects).

Jyn does a quick scan, like she’s been taught. Mid-teens, medium brown skin coloration, not yet full grown but already slightly taller than average, dark hair cut a little shorter than currently fashionable in the Core worlds, a cut-down Alliance uniform under a leather jacket that’s just a little too large. The holster under the jacket now has a blaster in it, and he has a small droid repair kit strapped to his left thigh. Probably a knife tucked under the kit, too. She looks back up at his face and notes dark eyes that flick from her too-large boots to her blaster to her braids like he’s cataloguing her as she catalogues him. Except for his crossed arms, he’s standing at parade rest, looking down his sharp nose at her with what he probably thinks is a neutral expression. It would be, too, except his lips are pressed a little too thin, his eyes just a touch too narrow. Jyn’s spent the last three years instinctively studying every face she sees, watching for treachery, searching for the signs that someone’s about to attack. She knows contempt when she sees it.

“Her bodyguards are at the base of the ladder,” the boy says at last. His voice has a lilting Mid-Rim accent; she guesses that Basic is probably not the language spoken in him home, if he has a home. “They will escort her to her shuttle.”

Jyn crosses her legs at the ankles and flicks a dismissive hand. “So go back to your droid, then.” The boy tilts his head slightly at this, as if surprised, and Jyn rolls her eyes. “What? I’m not blind. I saw you tinkering with that murderbot before the big red grouch sent you on babysitting duty.”

Now he definitely looks surprised, although he’s making a pretty decent attempt at hiding it. “The big red grouch,” he repeats slowly, shaking his head a little. “You noticed a lot, in there.”

“I do that,” Jyn says in a chilly tone, fiddling with the flask. It rattles in her hands; Leia finished it off with that last swig, it seems. Before he can comment on her training, or worse, ask about it, she shoots him a defiant look and asks derisively, “Don’t Alliance pukes teach you to pay attention? You know, gather intel?”

She catches what might be the flicker of a smile on his face. “Maybe.”

Jyn scrunches her nose and waves the flask at him. “They teach you to lurk in the shadows and watch little girls? Bit creepy.”

The poorly disguised scowl snaps back into place. “They teach me not to leave potential threats loose in our base,” he retorts.

“What, so you’re going to stand there and stare at me until I leave?” Jyn sits up straight for a moment, considers this, and then says in slightly rough Huttese, “ _A thousand demons to shit in your mouth, droid fucker.”_

Without missing a beat, he replies in the same tongue, only his accent is perfect. “ _A thousand maggots to writhe in your eyeballs, filthy thief._ ”

Jyn stares, and then the giggle bursts out of her before she can stop it. She claps a hand over her mouth, but she can’t quite stop it entirely, and she looks up at him with laughing eyes. The slight scowl on his face eases a little again, and he shifts his weight. “Knew I should have called you over, before,” she manages to get her voice mostly under control, although she can’t quite kill the grin. “Bet you could have curled her hair.”

“You were doing well enough yourself.”

Jyn settles again, tucking the empty flask away and dropping her hands to her belt. “So,” she says after a moment, when it’s clear he really isn’t going to leave. “You know my name, then.”

He nods, then seems to hesitate. “I know your first name,” he corrects carefully.

“Only name,” she says fiercely, hackles raised immediately. To his credit, he doesn’t push it, just stands there, looking down at her.

Jyn’s neck is starting to ache a bit from keeping it tilted so far back. “You gonna tell me _your_ name, or do I get to chose it?”

“I’m not sure I’d like what you would pick.”

“Probably not.”

He flicks an eyebrow at that, then says, “Micheal.”

Jyn snorts. “Sure, droid boy, and I’m Lafeyya Sungleam, intergalactic synthpop star.”

To her mild surprise, he chuckles a little at that, under his breath. “I know, I’m a big fan.”

“Look, you’re killing my neck here. Sit down, will you? And try again,” she tells him, as he slowly moves to take Leia’s vacated spot. “With the name.”

“Not _droid boy_.”

“No kidding? Seems like a good one, to me.”

He grunts at that, then taps the fingers of one hand against his knee contemplatively. “Would you believe Silas?”

“Definitely not.”

“Shu Craix.”

“You’re _not_ a Gossum trader.”

“Jorath.”

Jyn pauses, looks at him out of the corner of her eye. “Hmm.”

The boy looks back, knees drawn up and hands resting casually across them. His hands are never far from his weapon, she notes with a satisfaction she’s not sure she can explain. Maybe it’s just nice to see a supposed ally who actually know how to behave during war. “You like that one?”

“You could pass for a Jorath,” she concedes. “I mean, you’re not. But you could, if you tried.”

“Thanks.” His voice is dry, and a little lower than before. Briefly, she wonders what he’ll sound like when his voice has fully settled. “I’ll remember that.”

“Welcome,” she replies, magnanimous.

They lapse into a comfortable silence then, and Jyn looks out at the jungle and thinks that this is, well, _nice_. Sure, there’s an armed stranger next to her, and Saw’s probably going to come out of this meeting with his blood up, but the boy hasn’t asked her anything uncomfortable and, and...it’s been awhile since she’s just…sat somewhere.

“Well?” She prompts him after awhile.

She doesn’t look away from the jungle, but she can hear the smile in his voice again. “Aran,” he tries.

“No.”

“Rephego.”

“Hah.”

“Are you just rejecting everything out of hand?” he asks, sounding exasperated.

“It wouldn’t be a bad strategy, if I were, _droid boy_ ,” she shoots back. “Since you’re a liar.”

The silence this time is less comfortable, and Jyn watches him warily. He’s looking at her with another little scowl on his face, except this time she gets the strange feeling that it’s not really aimed at her. “Yes,” he says softly. “But sometimes I can tell the truth.”

Something about the way he says that tugs at Jyn, makes her want to shove him or shout or just do _something_ sudden and loud. She wiggles around so that she’s facing him, cross legged (arms still wrapped around her abdomen, hand resting close to her blaster, of course). “Okay then. Bargain, droid boy.” She waits for him to turn a little more towards her, listening. “If I guess it right, you have to admit it. You don’t lie and tell me I guessed right on a fake name.”

He raises an eyebrow. “And in turn?”

Jyn tilts her chin in challenge. “I believe you.”

She expects him to laugh, maybe say _that’s it?_ Instead, he stares at her, and for the first time his face is completely blank. Jyn squirms a little under the weight of it, but doesn’t drop her eyes.

“Okay,” he says after a long moment.

Feeling more triumphant than she really should, Jyn sticks a hand out, palm up, the way the smugglers in Onderon do. “Bargain,” she says.

Briefly, he presses the flat of his own hand over hers, then pulls back. “Bargain,” he agrees.

Jyn studies him for a moment. “Ethan,” she tries, but she’s already shaking her head before he finishes saying no.

He’s Mid-Rim, clearly not upper class like Leia, but not from the gutters like most of the Partisans. Farm boy, or miner, she thinks, and throws out, “Zhaffen.”

His mouth pulls into a half smile. “Not a miner.”

Jyn glares to cover her surprise at how quickly he figured out her thought chain. “Salvor.”

“No.”

“Rhys.”

“Too high-born,” he tells her. “Aim a little lower.”

“I _could_ ,” she grumbles, giving him a threatening glower and flexing her hands.

He nods, though the half smile is still in place. “I don’t doubt it. But you can’t beat my name out of me.”

“Bet I could. Trec.”

“Doesn’t that mean _fool_ in Rodian?”

“Nial.”

“Now you’re reaching.”

“Aach,” she snaps pointedly.

He quirks an eyebrow. “Force keep you.”

“What?”

“That’s what people say when you sneeze, isn’t it?”

“I wasn’t _sneezing_ ,” Jyn rolls her eyes, irritated both at his stupid joke and the fact that he is clearly needling her on purpose. “It means _liar_.” At his look, she amends, “Alright, it means _secret-keeper_ , but if you say it rude enough, people know you mean _liar_.”

“Do you want a hint?” The boy offers it casually enough, but Jyn can tell from the way his shoulders tense that he regrets it immediately. Jyn’s always getting in trouble for speaking impulsively; she understands that feeling.

“Shut it,” she tells him flatly, and doesn’t acknowledge the way he relaxes slightly. “I’ll get it eventually.”

He looks at her again, with that same blank expression he’d worn when she offered this bargain. It makes him look a little like a droid himself, in a way, emotionless and detached. The more she studies him, though, the more she starts to think that it makes him look a little sad, too.

“I believe you,” he says quietly.

 _Yes_ , Jyn decides to herself. _Definitely a little sad_. But why? What is it about his name that makes him look like that, like he’s half hoping she’ll guess and determined not to care anyway? She wonders how many people in this ragged, half-empty ruin ever call him by his name. Does he have to hide, too, like her? For the very first time, Jyn has the sudden urge to ask someone about their past.

“Ensign, acknowledge!” A crackling voice snaps into the silence between them. They both start, and Jyn realizes abruptly that they’ve turned entirely to face each other, knees only a few inches apart. They both still have their arms crossed, hands near weapons, so she doesn’t feel too stupid about it. Still…she decides not to mention this part to Saw, when he grills her on what intel she gathered on this trip.

The boy snaps his wrist com up and flicks it to private mode, so that the incoming voice is routed to his earpiece instead of over speaker. They both climb to their feet as he answers with a sharp, “Sir.”

Jyn leans her weight back on her heels and watches him, as he listens carefully to whatever the crackling voice says. Most people like to turn their backs when they take calls, going for some illusion at privacy. In the civilian world, Jyn knows she is expected to also turn away, complete the illusion. In the real world, she just thinks it’s a good opportunity to go through their pockets. The boy doesn’t turn, though, not bothering to pretend that she isn’t standing there listening in as much as she can. He doesn’t say anything useful, though, just acknowledges some order and then clicks off the comm.

“The meeting is over,” he tells her, and his face has gone back to that neutral expression with just a hint of disapproval. “Your shuttle leaves in ten.”

Jyn nods, considers, and then turns for the ladder. “See you around, droid boy.”

“You still don’t know my name,” he calls softly from behind her.

“For now,” she replies flippantly, not looking back.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The hardest part about writing child-soldiers (beyond the soul crushing realization that they are not, in fact, a purely fictional concept) is remembering to write them as children while also acknowledging that they are not really children. Especially in this case, where Jyn's been fighting and maybe killing people for years and at this point Cassian's been doing it the majority of his life. I wanted them to sound younger, be less polished and skilled than they are by the events of Rogue One, but to also not be silly and carefree like 11 and 16 year old kids should be. And I couldn't get rid of the idea that even by then, Cassian's already been so many people that he already misses having someone know his real name. (Oh no, I made myself sad.)


	3. i fought the war

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The war is not over. 
> 
> Jyn and Leia meet again, when (almost) everything is different.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now with 80% less Canon Compliancy!

The war is not over. If anything, Leia thinks as she gracefully declines yet another drunken invitation to join the nearest dancers, the war has only just begun for real. Leia knows her history; the war against the Empire has been waged longer than the Empire has technically existed. Her father (dead, ashes, gone in a flash of green light and a twist of Leia’s heart) formed the Alliance with like-minded Senators before the Emperor dared to claim his throne. Until now, however, it’s been a cold war, fought with spies and sabotage and the occasional assassination, when they could manage it. But after Scarif, after the Death Star…well, Leia tells herself as she sidesteps an entwined pair of corporals who are far too enraptured or too relieved or simply too drunk to notice they are blocking the corridor, well, things are different now.

Everything is different now.

Alderaan is dead.

Leia smiles, and waves, and hands out medals, and nods and comforts and persuades and argues and flat out commands where necessary – she can do these things, all of them and more, because that is what the Alliance needs from her, that is what the war demands. But she cannot – will not – celebrate. Streaks of fire still light up the Yavin IV sky as pieces of the Death Star plunge into atmosphere and burn their way down, but nothing remains in the Alderaan system but cold chunks of rock and dust. Leia’s parents are dead. Her aunts, her tutors, her cousins and nephews and nieces and retainers and security guards and friends and…

Alderaan is dead, and Leia is not prepared to celebrate.

She will never admit it, but as she ducks and weaves through a throng of shouting, dancing, laughing (crying, drinking, coping) people, Leia is looking for a place to hide.

Someone grabs her arm, and she turns, diplomatic smile already fixed as she prepares to explain, _again_ , that she really does not want to dance. The smile dies on the vine, however, because the other woman does not look in the least bit drunk, friendly, or at all inclined to dance. She’s only slightly taller than Leia, with brown hair only marginally tamed into a loose bun, and fierce green eyes. Her clothes are ragged and patched, and Leia can see singe marks in more than one place. She has a blaster slung around her hips and at least one knife that Leia can pick out under a grubby mechanic’s vest, and the hand not holding Leia’s arm is wrapped tightly around a large, dark flask of some kind.

“Hey,” she says bluntly, just loud enough to be heard over the squeaky music some exuberant Chadra-Fan are playing in a nearby briefing room. “Saw Gerrera sent me to interrogate you.”

Leia stares at her. The other woman simply tilts her head, as if she’s just given some polite greeting and is waiting for Leia to respond appropriately. Leia looks at the other woman’s grip on her arm (old, frayed fingerless gloves, a bandage of some kind sticking out under her sleeve) and then back up at that expectant expression. She considers politely but firmly saying that she has business to attend…but then, this woman doesn’t look like someone who cares much for politeness (she looks a little like Han Solo, to be honest, which does not much encourage Leia to be polite, either).

So instead, feeling a strange mix of relief and guilt coloring the already chaotic mess of her feelings, Leia jerks her arm away and snaps, “What the flaming hells are you talking about, laserbrain?”

The woman lets her go without resistance, but her mouth twists into a sharp-edged smirk. “Laserbrain?” She repeats. “Well, guess it’s better than ‘silly girl.’ But I really thought you could do better than that.”

And Leia remembers.

“Jyn.”

The woman nods. “Well, that took you long enough.” And then, in accented Mandalorian, she adds, “ _Your worm-addled brain refuses to serve you_.”

“ _Nim gar troac varbeck_ ,” Leia retorts, and Jyn’s smirk grows a little wider, edging almost into an actual smile.

“Come on,” she says, gesturing with the flask. “This party is…” she pauses, quirks an eyebrow at Leia, then finishes with, “stupid.”

Leia hesitates, because however much she hates it, this party is for the Alliance, for the people who need it, and Leia is right now a critical figure within the Alliance. They’ve lost too many critical figures recently that her absence won’t go unnoted…

But the memory of which critical figures, exactly, that are now missing from the ranks of the rebels pushes at Leia, and she spins to follow Jyn. The other woman is already several steps away, dodging around a dancing Bothan towards a creaky looking ladder propped up against the hanger wall nearby. Leia hurries to catch up, and tries not to think about how old this ladder might be (is it the same one?) as she climbs up after her.

On the roof, there are still a few soldiers and guards on duty, but Jyn walks in an unwavering line towards the edge of the roof, walking around an ancient pillar of stone that affords at least a small measure of privacy. Leia slides down next to her in the dust, heedless of the white of her gown, and allows herself, just this once, a quiet sigh.

“Here,” the woman shoves the flask almost into Leia’s face as she plops down gracelessly beside her.

For a long moment, neither speaks. Leia tilts her head back and looks at the night sky above them, watching for one of the brief flashes of light that indicate yet another bit of Death Star rubble has entered atmo. She doesn’t see one, and she’s not sure if it’s a relief or a disappointment.

Leia takes a sip of the flask, and nearly gags. “What in the worlds –“ At Jyn’s sidelong look, Leia cuts off, reconsiders, and blurts instead, “What diarrhetic mynock pissed in this flask?”

“You’ll have to ask General Redhead,” Jyn replies. “Nicked it from his belt earlier. Probably not poisoned, though I wouldn’t put it past that sweaty arsehole.” Her voice turns a little too dark at the last few words to be as light-hearted as she probably meant to be, but Leia’s brain is already racing through her mental catalogue of generals (what few are left) to really notice.

“Wait, ‘Redhead?’ The only…you stole this from _General Draven_? Head of Intelligence? The least friendly, most suspicious bastard in this entire organization?” Leia struggles, at a rare loss for words. Eventually, she strangles out a half-amused, half-horrified, " _Why?"_

Jyn shrugs, swipes the flask, and slams it back for a long moment. “Figured he owed me a drink,” she says blandly, dropping it back to her lap.

Leia really should probably say something about that, should probably take the flask and go back down to the party and maybe find what few other people on this base are already done celebrating (stone-faced, pragmatic General Draven is likely to be one of them). She should stop hiding on the roof and start preparing for the coming war.

Something inside her shrivels a little as she contemplates it. “Give me that,” she says testily, taking back the flask and throwing back another bitter, burning swallow. “ _Kriff_ , this bantha shit is awful. I think I'm getting drunk off the fumes alone.”

Jyn snags the flask and taps Leia’s wrist with it reprovingly before drinking. “Maybe you’re just a skrogging lightweight, Princess.”

“Don’t,” Leia’s voice cracks slightly, and she stops herself, swallows. “I am not a princess,” she manages in a flat tone.

She braces herself for the arguments, the ones that someone makes whenever she declaims the title that surely has no meaning now.

(“But, Your Highness, there are still so many loyal Alderaanians who will think of you as their shining symbol,” one fervent aide of Mon Mothma’s exclaims.

“You cannot let your family’s legacy die, Daughter of the House of Organa,” Ackbar proclaims in his ponderous, solemn way.

“My lady, you haven’t accepted any other formal rank yet,” Dodonna chides, stroking his beard.

Leia sort of wants to punch them.)

“No, you’re a pretentious skall-shriek with more hair than karking sense,” Jyn tells her without missing a beat, and Leia sort of wants to hug her.

“Snarling gutter-snipe bitch,” she shoots back instead, and Jyn shoves the flask back at her approvingly.

“Bile-tainted _sleemo_ in a poncy white dress.”

“Crud-covered nerf herder in -” Leia looks a little harder at Jyn’s clothes, and snorts. “Is that even your shirt? You’re practically swimming in it.”

“ _E chu ta_ ,” Jyn growls a touch more defensively than Leia expects. “I had to borrow one.”

“Right. Borrow. What unlucky _sculag_ found himself donating to the cause?”

Jyn shifts her weight, and says, “Don’t,” in the same brittle tone Leia had used herself.

Leia blinks, not sure why a woman who so proudly stole booze (from a _general_ ) would stumble over stealing a shirt. She hunts for a way to change the subject, but before she can Jyn adds quietly, “Mine was too bloody, after Scarif. My…partner gave me a spare.”

“You were on Scarif,” Leia’s voice turns incredulous. “I thought no one survived Scarif.”

Jyn’s smirk twists back onto her face, but the edges are even sharper than before. “Surprise.”

It takes Leia another moment to piece it together. “You transmitted the plans.”

“And you brought them back to the Alliance,” Jyn grunts, drinks, hands the flask to Leia.

“Some of High Command wanted to give you a medal, too,” Leia tells her, frowning; the alcohol must be starting to affect her because there is something wrong with that picture. “Wait, why _didn’t_ I give you a medal today? At the ceremony?”

“Because I’d have knocked your fucking kneecaps backwards if you tried.”

“Ah.” A brief flash of light across the sky; Leia watches another piece of the monstrosity that destroyed her world burn into the atmosphere. She should let it go, like the shirt, like _princess_ , but somehow she can’t. “What you did, though,” she says softly. “Whatever we’re saying now, I know Rogue One wasn’t sanctioned.”

“Hence the ‘Rogue,’” Jyn cuts in irritably.

“You’re still a hero,” Leia snaps back. “You could be gracious and accept it.”

“You could be less _gracious_ ," Jyn all but spits the word, as vile as any curse, "and demand a _shabuir_ medal for your own damn self.” She makes a sharp, derisive noise that could almost be called a laugh. “Everyone falling all over themselves to pat the smuggler and the farm boy on the back, but I didn’t see anyone hanging any shining bits of fucking gold on _your_ neck, _shutta._ ”

“I was only doing what was needful,” Leia replies defensively, and Jyn jabs the flask at her pointedly until she rolls her eyes. “Yes, alright, I _know_. _Fine_. We’re both big, damn heroes and it doesn’t karking _matter._ ” Leia huffs, takes the flask, glares at it for a moment, and then drinks like she has something to prove. It burns less this time, and she doesn’t really know if that’s good or bad, and she doesn’t really care. “ _Yraatz brizzang zwur bagez_ ,” she grumbles.

“Ubese,” Jyn identifies it with almost obscene satisfaction as she shakes the flask a little, checking how full it is. “You went and learned Outer Rim bounty hunter lingo. Well done, Hero of the Karking Rebellion.”

“Well, I had to live up to the legend,” Leia replies snidely, waving a hand at Jyn in a grand gesture of presentation normally reserved for sweeping Senatorial speeches. “I hadn’t even heard of it, before you.” It’s as close as either of them have come to discussing the past, and Leia feels herself flinch from it as much as Jyn does. “And anyway,” she hurries to add, “You never know when that sort of thing might come in handy.”

“You never know,” Jyn echoes.

“It’s good to be prepared.”

“Smart, too.”

“We have much to prepare for, now,” Leia pauses, swallows, stares at the night sky over Yavin IV. “The war is not over."

"No."

"We have so much to do."

“Soon enough,” Jyn agrees, and almost gently sets the flask back in Leia’s unresisting hand. Everything is different now, Leia thinks, and says softly, "May the Force be with us."

She glances over at Jyn, who glares at the sky as if she's considering punching it. "It had fucking _better,_ " she growls, and despite herself, Leia smiles.

Well. Maybe not everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who maybe isn't such a complete dork, Ubese is officially a language used by bounty hunters in the Outer Rim, and is the language Leia speaks to Jabba when she goes to free Han Solo in ROTJ. The phrase she uses in this chapter is entirely made up, and you are free to imagine what she said to Jyn. Assume it was creatively unpleasant; I sure did! 
> 
> Also, tiny Firefly reference because Leia absolutely deserves it. (I've never gotten over how Luke and Han get medals and Leia just stands there and smiles like a decorative statue and no one comments on her heroism or grief or anything. Arg. /Rant)


	4. hello my old heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s not entirely sure what it means, but she’s home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't at all what I originally wanted it to be, but every time I re-wrote it, it just kept twisting back this direction. So I guess this is where Jyn and Cassian wanted to be.

“The only thing I regret,” Jyn tells her, speaking in the careful tones of someone who is not drunk but is seriously considering getting there soon. “Is that I wasn’t there to hear what you said to Solo after he finally dragged his shifty arse back to the fight.”

 “It’s not as shifty as he wants people to think. And what do you _think_ I said?” Leia sniffs primly, “I welcomed him warmly to the Alliance.” She brushes absently at a smudge on her ceremonial white gown, the one she has been dying to burn on a pyre the moment she finds some clothes in this base that fit her. She’s probably further along the drunken spectrum than her drinking buddy (and childhood friend? Can she call a girl she met once during a political negotiation a friend?), but damned if she’s going to admit it. Half of being a bloody ambassador is knowing how to look poised when you are anything but.

“Bantha-shit,” Jyn snorts. “You’re about as warm as a chagrian’s choobies, at least as far as that man goes. And Solo’s arse is absolutely as shifty as he wants you to think.” She paused, examined the near-empty flask in her hands, and then handed it back to Leia with a shrug.

“I don’t care what Han kriffing Solo wants me to think about his arse,” Leia fires back, downing a particularly large swallow of whatever the hell was in that flask. General Draven has the constitution of a Rancor, if he drinks this jet fuel on the regular. “And I can be warm, thank you very much.”

“With Solo’s arse?”

Leia glares. “You,” she says in her chilliest tone, “are a green-hearted liverless glit-biter and your humor is, is…” Leia shakes her head as if she can rattle something loose, then gives up with an eyeroll so powerful it makes her head ache slightly. “Repugnant.”

“ _Repugnant_ ,” Jyn scoffs, shaking her head. “And you were doing so fucking _well_ , powderpuff.”

“I’m getting too drunk for this,” Leia mutters.

“Skrogging lightweight.”

Leia scrambles gracelessly to her feet and takes a breath to steady herself, tucking a stray hair back into her neat buns. “You know, if you’re joining the Alliance, technically I can court martial your disrespectful duff, you whilk-licker.”

Jyn smirks and tosses her the near-empty flask. “Give it a go, ferbil fucker,” she says placidly.

For the first time in hours, Leia laughs as she makes her careful way to the ladder. “ _Yraate irrgat uhro gherya_.”

“Same to you, rebel scum,” Jyn calls after her, and then settles back against the stone pillar, folding her arms and stretching her legs out. For a long moment, she simply sits, listening to the distant sounds of desperate people celebrating their unexpected survival, drinking themselves into a frenzy to forget that it’s only a temporary reprieve. Jyn’s not perfectly sober herself – whatever Big Red had in that flask was more potent than she had expected – but even though she’s not technically in enemy territory, there is no way she’s about to let her guard down so far as to get drunk.

Maybe someday, she thinks idly, she will be somewhere that feels safe enough.

Speaking of _safe_ -

 “You,” she tells the dark trees of the Yavin jungle, “are supposed to be in the karking medward.”

A faint scrape of cloth, a thoughtful hum that does more to sober Jyn up than a bucket of cold water, and Cassian comes limping slowly around the pillar. “How did you know?”

“You’re not as sneaky as you think you are,” Jyn replies, craning her head back to look up at him.  She glares at the bandages peeking out from his shirt collar, and the second-hand plasteel brace on his left leg that runs almost from ankle to hip. He sees her looking and raises an eyebrow, looking pointedly at her bandaged arm and wrenched knee. “Broken spine,” she counters. 

With a sigh, he leans against the pillar and slides carefully down. “The implants have set,” he tells her softly. “The scars are already closed over.”

“So you thought you’d go climb around on the kriffing roof? This morning the doctor wouldn’t even let you stand up.” Jyn squints at him suspiciously. “Cassian Andor, you nerf-herder, did you _break out_?”

He looks at her from the corner of his eye, a faint smile softening the lines of his mouth. “I got permission to attend the party.” She waits, staring, and after a moment he caves. “Technically, I’m supposed to stay in the hangar. In a chair.”

“I’m going to have to carry you back down there, aren’t I?” Jyn grumbles, and then immediately regrets it. She doesn’t know how to _do_ this, doesn’t know how to deal with someone else’s pain. In her head, Saw tells her to cull the weak, leave the dead. In her gut, five years of living in the criminal underworld whispers _run, run now, run before they turn on you_. Next to her, Cassian reaches up slowly and shoves his hair off his forehead, watching a piece of the Death Star burning as it enters atmosphere.

Jyn clenches her fists and settles back harder against the stone pillar, stubbornly anchoring herself on the rough stone.    

Instead of being offended at her peevish comment, Cassian gives a soft huff that might almost be a laugh and leans his head back to look up at the sky. “It’s warm enough out here,” he tells her. “You can just leave me.”

“No,” she snaps immediately, sharper than she intends.

To his credit, Cassian winces at the poor choice of words and raises a hand apologetically.

They sit in silence for a while, and Jyn forces her shoulders to relax as she listens to him breathe, because she _didn’t_ leave him behind, and she doesn’t have to, she _doesn’t_ , he said _welcome home_ and climbed a tower with broken bones to come back to her, and Jyn’s doesn’t know how to stay but damned if she can’t learn.

She’s not entirely sure what it means, but she’s home.

“You don’t remember, do you?” Cassian’s voice is still soft, but there’s a wistful undertone that startles her, and Jyn frowns at him.

“What?”

“You remember Organa,” he says, still staring at the sky. “But then,” his voice turns meditative, and she watches him drumming a finger against his damaged leg.  “She is very memorable, and I try not to be.” Thoughtfully, he adds, “I suppose it’s a compliment.”

“How many pain meds are you on?” Jyn demands.

A pause, then Cassian turns his head against the stone to look at her and asks quietly, “If I told you my name, would you believe me?”

Jyn opens her mouth to say _of course I would, what kind of question is that?_ And then something in her brain clicks and she hears herself say instead, “Droid boy.”

He groans, rolls his eyes. “ _That’s_ what you remember,” he mutters, sounding mildly disgruntled.

But Jyn suddenly feels like she’s just won the Corellian lotto, like she’s swallowed a tiny sun that’s burning in her chest, warm and bright, and she doesn’t bother to stop the laugh that bubbles out of her mouth. “That was _you,_ ” she giggles – giggles! How many friggin’ years has it been since she’s done something so childish as _giggle_ – and turns suddenly to sit facing him, crossing her legs. “ _Your eyeballs to writhe with a thousand maggots_ ,” she says in rough Huttese.

“ _Your hands to wither and drop off.”_ His accent, Jyn notes with displeasure, is still better than hers. Worse, though Huttese is objectively one of the ugliest languages in the universe, in Cassian’s voice it almost sounds…well, to be honest, the man could read an instruction manual for a toaster and Jyn would probably be enraptured. Damn it.

To hide the fact that she’s staring at his lips, Jyn pulls her face into a familiar scowl and fires back. “ _Your overlarge ears to be spitted on shafts of fire.”_

His eyebrow quirks up at that one _. “Overlarge?”_ he grumbles, but before she can do more than smirk, he adds, _“Your descendants to be crushed in the jaws of rancors.”_

 _“Your sexual organs to sprout wings and fly away,”_ Jyn says in a prim voice ripped straight from Leia.

Cassian makes a small choking noise that is almost a laugh, and Jyn feels the warmth from earlier spreading up her chest towards her face. _“Your toenails to grow backwards,”_ he manages in a mostly level voice.

_“Your intestines to be wound around a tree until you are really sorry!”_

At that, he breaks, ducks his head and laughs quietly, and forget the Corellian lotto, Jyn’s just been crowned Queen of karking Naboo. “I _told_ you I would get your name,” she crows.

The laugh trails off into a comfortable silence, and he flicks an amused eyebrow at her in acknowledgement of her victory.  “And I told you I believed you.”

Jyn tilts her head and looks him over with a critical eye. “It’s the beard,” she decides. “’S why I didn’t recognize you. You look a lot different with the beard.” Without thinking, she reaches out and touches his cheek. Her bare fingertips brush lightly along his cheekbone, and she’s only half-surprised to discover that the rough feel of his stubble against her skin sets her heart galloping. She’s only half-surprised to see the pulse at his throat speed up to match.

She traces a short line from his cheekbone to his jaw, and Cassian sits very still and lets her.  “I believed you,” he says in a voice so soft it is almost a whisper, and his breath caressing her palm feels entirely too warm, too intimate. She almost jerks away, and he feels it because he stops talking and presses his lips together, swallowing back whatever else he was about to say.

Instinctively, Jyn knows that if she pulls her hand away now and changes the subject, not only will he let her, he’ll never bring it up again. The part of Jyn that has been trained almost from birth to never speak of the past wants to do just that. There is a small, new part of her, though, a part born the moment he shot a Partisan aiming a grenade at her position, a part that took root when he ran through a collapsing tomb to drag her to safety even though she was no longer important to his mission – that part of her wants desperately to…to what? What does she _want?_

 _I don’t know,_ she thinks a little wildly, a little sadly, a little irritably. _How could I possibly know?_

She drops her hand, but doesn’t sit back. Something that might be disappointment lurks in the lines of his face, but she thinks there is understanding in his eyes, too, so she’s brave enough to meet his gaze. “When you were looking for…for my father,” she asks, keeping her voice steady and her eyes locked on his. “When you were looking for me, was that how you knew I was connected to Saw?”

He nods. “It’s also how I knew Galen Erso was connected to Saw,” he adds. “Since he left his daughter with the Partisans.”

“If you knew he abandoned me with Saw,” Jyn tries to keep the bitterness out of her voice, because he’s dead and she doesn’t know if she forgives him, “if you knew that, why did you think I would help you find him?”

Cassian stays silent for a long time, studying her face. Jyn clenches her jaw but stares defiantly back, letting him look, wondering what he sees. Finally, he says, “You got angry with me when I tried to probe for your last name. It was fifty-fifty that you either hated your family name, or were trying to protect it.”

 _Or both_ , he doesn’t say but she hears anyway. “Fifty-fifty,” she murmurs, still a little thrown at how well he reads her, how easily she can understand him. “Pretty big risk.”

“Hope,” he reminds her gently, that trace of a smile back again.

“Hope,” Jyn repeats lightly, then shakes her head and studies her gloved hands. In the distance, someone must have told a good joke because several voices burst into laughter. The thin sound of some sort of horn music threads through the noise, and someone just below them breaks into a wobbly rendition of an old miner’s song. Jyn takes a deep breath, remembers _welcome home_ , and says softly, “I’m going to have to get used to that, aren’t I?”

He waits until she looks up at him to answer, and the look on his face makes her breath catch almost painfully in her chest.  When he speaks, his voice is low and rough, and there’s a promise there that Jyn isn’t quite ready to acknowledge but desperately needs to hear.

“I hope so,” Cassian says, and Jyn doesn’t know how to stay, but for that, she can learn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The "Huttese" insults are a mix of Shakespeare, Terry Pratchett, and my own strange brain. Jyn probably talks more in this story than she does in all my other stories combined, and it's mostly cursing. I don't know what that says about me.


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